Biztalk
Nigeria turns down
$80m tobacco investment
Nigeria has rejected an offer by an unidentified foreign firm to establish a tobacco plant worth US$80 million in the country, amidst rising awareness on the dangers of cigarette smoking. Health Minister Adenike Grange, disclosed the government's decision to reject the offer at a forum in the capital city of Abuja . ''I must emphasize that it was a demonstration of the government's unwavering determination to protect its people and safeguard their health that it sometime last year ignored a huge investment and job opportunities by refusing a foreign firm from starting another cigarette producing factory worth about "80 million dollars,'' the Minister said at the launch of a group called Coalition Against Tobacco (CAT).
Last November, the Nigerian government sued the British-American Tobacco PLC (BAT) and two other tobacco companies for 5.3 trillion naira for the havoc done to under-aged smokers in Nigeria (US$1=118 naira). The two other companies are Philip Morris International and International Tobacco Ltd. Two affiliate companies of BAT, British-American Tobacco ( Nigeria ) Ltd., and British-American Tobacco (Investment), were also sued alongside the parent company. In the suit, filed by the Attorney-General of the Federation before a Federal High Court in Abuja, government said tobacco-related products manufactured and sold by the defendants were addictive and hazardous to public health. Specifically, government is seeking court injunction compelling the companies and their agents to cease the marketing, promotion, distribution and sale of the products to minors and under-aged persons. The plaintiff also asked for court order restraining the defendants from representing or portraying to persons under the age of 18 years any alluring and misleading image regarding tobacco-related products.
Glo mobile now Nigeria ’s
largest cellphone company
Cellullar-News, a respected wireless telecoms’ online publisher says Glo Mobile is now the No. 1 network in the Nigerian market, pushing MTN Nigeria, to the second position. Cellullar-News recently conducted a survey of networks in Africa and Middle East . Cellular News said since the last review of the region (Africa and the Middle East), there has been a number of adjustments to the data, most notably in Nigeria where the regulator has supplied new data on the market. The report said Glo Mobile subscriber numbers have been revised upwards to just over 15 million, enough to give it fourth place in the region last quarter, ahead of MTN Nigeria . It listed the top 10 operators in Africa and the Middle East as Vodacom SA (22.5 million), TCI Iran (19.5 million), STC Saudi Arabia (15.8 million), Glo Mobile (over 15 million), MTN Nigeria (14.99 million), MTN South Africa (14.1 million), Mobinil (added 1.8 million new connections), Maroc Telecoms (12.8 million), Orascom Algeria (12.7 million), Vodafone Egypt 912.2 million).
“MTN subsidiaries take both fifth and sixth place this quarter. MTN Nigeria is now the largest single unit within the group, ahead of MTN South Africa. The Nigerian company added nearly one million new connections to end the quarter with 14.99 million subscribers, while the South African company added 0.67 million, to reach a total of 14.1 million. Mobile ownership continues to spread across the region. At the end of June there were over 60 networks with more than one million customers; three months later that number has risen to over 70, with many of these being multi-million operations. All of the top 15 operators have more than six million customers and the three of these in 11th, 12th and 13th places overall - Algeria Telecom Mobile, Celtel Nigeria and Safaricom Kenya have over nine million. At their current growth rates, all three will pass the ten million mark in the current quarter (Q4 2007).” The report went further: “Over 32 million net additions were made in the three months to end September, some 2 million more than were connected in the previous best quarter, Q4 2006,” said the report. Glo Mobile, owned by the Mike Adenuga Group, commenced operations in August 2003. It is credited with the phenomenal growth in the Nigerian telecoms industry as it crashed the cost of telephony in the country, making it affordable to a broad spectrum of the society. It also pioneered the introduction of many products and services into the Nigerian market such as 2.5G, Per Second Billing, picture messaging (MMS), Mobile Internet, Blackberry, Voice SMS, Vehicle Tracking and lately 3G
Nigeria is best performing
stock market in the world in 2007
It might be a little difficult to believe but Nigeria has emerged as the best performing stock market in the world in 2007, leaving Slovenia and India behind at the second and third places. Nigeria was the best performing market with gains of 115 per cent, followed by Slovenia with 87.62 per cent and India with 80 per cent, a study by Standard & Poors revealed. Overall, emerging markets rose 42 per cent in 2007 as against a gain of 9.4 per cent in developed markets, according to Standard & Poors-Citigroup BMI global index. The current and expected sales growth in emerging equity markets fueled their returns in 2007. As a result, there was an outflow of cash from the developed markets into emerging markets, S&P Senior Index Analyst Howard Silverblatt said. The month of December saw 19 of the 26 developed world equity markets landing in negative territory, an improvement from the 24 developed markets that were down in November.
Across the emerging market board, the losses were moderate with both Peru (-4.64 per cent) and China (-3.82 per cent) declining the most during the month. However, both countries posted strong full-year gains of 72.88 per cent and 69.83 per cent respectively. India markets witnessed positive returns across all the time spans with gains of 9.09 per cent during the one month period, 25.19 per cent in three-months and full year-gains of 80.85 per cent. Out of the 26 emerging markets, 11 gained at least 50 per cent in 2007 with Nigeria coming in best with a 115.32 per cent gain. China gained 69.83 per cent, ranking seventh. Losses were mostly modest in December although Iceland (-11.58 per cent) posted its second consecutive month of double digit declines (-15.48 per cent for November). Canada rebounded from its double-digit November loss (-11.17 per cent) to post a 2.69 per cent gain in December, while Luxembourg was the best developed market performer last month, gaining 3.83 per cent, the study shows. Nine of the ten sectors posted losses in December compared to just seven in November. Both figures stand in sharp contrast to October and September, when all ten sectors were up. The Energy sector posted a strong 5.41 per cent December gain, with the US energy sector performing the best. Conversely, consumer discretionary was the worst performing sector last month, declining 3.26 per cent, with US issues hit the hardest.
Investors at Stock Market stake
N2.2 billion on insurance stocks
The Insurance stocks continued to be the investors' delight as they staked 2.2 billion naira on 480.9 million shares recorded in 5,817 deals at the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) in January 2008. The Insurance sub sector continued to lead the activity chart in Turnover Volume. Continental Reinsurance Plc was the most sorted after shares with 84 million turnover valued at 367 million naira. Equity Assurance Plc followed with 80 million shares worth 316 million naira. LASACO Assurance Plc sold 63.1 million shares valued at 274.9 million naira. The Banking sub sector followed in the activity chart as 232.2 million shares valued at 5.8 billion naira were recorded in 7,794 deals. Activity in the sub sector was boosted by the shares of Fidelity Bank Plc of 28.9 million shares worth 324.8 million naira.
Oceanic Bank International Plc followed as 20.544 million shares changed hands worth 560.5 million naira. Diamond Bank also recorded a turnover of 20.4 million shares valued at 462.6 million naira while First Inland Bank Plc traded 18.6 million shares worth 248.3 million naira. The Conglomerates sub sector came in third. It traded 51.4 million shares valued at 229.6 million naira.
Drug Company Pfizer
Fights Nigerian Lawsuits
The world's largest drug company is embroiled in a global controversy over whether it tested an unapproved drug on sick children in Nigeria without their full understanding. The case involving Pfizer raises questions about how to protect human subjects as American companies conduct more and more drug trials around the world. In 1996, a meningitis epidemic hit the state of Kano . Researchers from the American company, Pfizer, treated 100 Nigerian children with the experimental drug, Trovan. The Nigerian government and the Kano state government are suing Pfizer over the drug trial. They say it caused the deaths of 11 children and seriously disabled others. The Plaintiff's Attorney, Peter Safirstein says, "What Pfizer did here is despicable and reprehensible and what they did here was to take advantage of young children and use them for an unauthorized and unapproved medical experiment."
Safirstein, of the law firm Milberg Weiss, is representing 30 Nigerian families in a lawsuit filed in New York. He accused Pfizer of not informing the children that they were taking part in a medical experiment and that there were other alternative medications available at the time. Pfizer has filed its own lawsuit, charging that the report on which the Nigerian government based its claims against the company is illegal and inaccurate. And the company says on its Web site that any deaths during the clinical trial were the direct result of the illness and not the treatment provided to patients. Pfizer vice president Dr. Jack Watters also released a video statement. "This trial was conducted with the full approval of the Nigerian government, with the consent of the parents, the guardians of the children, and in consistency with the laws of Nigeria." he said. Whatever the outcome of the lawsuits, the Pfizer case illustrates the difficulty in protecting human subjects as more and more drug trials are conducted around the world. International standards such as the Declaration of Helsinki govern the ethics of drug trials. But some health experts say these regulations are weak and have no enforcement mechanism.
"It will always be tempting for any for-profit corporation to go to that place where regulation is the weakest, to that place where human subjects' protections are the worst, really going to the place with the lowest ethical standards, a kind of race to the ethical bottom," says, Dr. Peter Lurie, who is deputy head of health research at the advocacy group, Public Citizen, in Washington. "That temptation will always be there until a time when we have strong international standards. We don't have them now." Dr. Lurie argues that many citizens of developing countries with poor health infrastructures are desperate for medical treatment and vulnerable to exploitation. "To the extent that they [trial participants] are motivated by desperation and needing to get treatment, to the extent that they believe that they will benefit from being in the trial even though that may not be the case, those are bad reasons for people to be in trials." Alan Goldhammer is a regulatory official for the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, a lobbying group in Washington .
He says drug trials in developing countries are critical to researching treatments for diseases such as bacterial meningitis, which is rare in the United States. "Our companies are developing new pharmaceuticals for a worldwide market. They are also trying to make every effort to address diseases that are common in developing countries and certainly many new antibiotics that are being developed will have good therapeutic use in those countries." Goldhammer says another reason American companies conduct trials in developing countries is to try to cut the time and cost required for drug development. "It's running now [at] about 800 million dollars to develop a new drug and it's anywhere from 12 to 14 years and clearly for patients who need new therapies this is too long and too costly. So we're looking at a variety of ways to try to shorten the time period and reduce the cost." Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel is head of clinical bioethics at the National Institutes of Health, the primary U.S. medical research agency. He says the vast majority of drug research does not exploit human subjects. But he says researchers should provide what he calls "fair benefits" to the participants in a drug trial. "Is the community in which you're doing a trial getting other health benefits? Are there economic benefits? Are you preparing the community to be able to do a lot more research and maybe engage in the research enterprise? Are you training people?" he said.As for Pfizer's 1996 trial of Trovan in Kano , the Nigerian government says the drug company did not behave ethically. It is seeking compensation for the children and families of those involved.
© 2007 